A year-plus ago, I left Failbetter, the company I founded. I said: “I’ll be walking the earth like Jules in Pulp Fiction walking the earth like Caine in Kung Fu. Oh all right I mean I’ll hang out my shingle as a freelancer. I have the entrepreneur’s bug and I’ll probably found another studio eventually, Read more

[This is basically a copied/pasted Slack post from a discussion I had with the team on a client project. I’ve tidied it up for the blog, but I haven’t rewritten it.] ‘QBN’ [quality-based narrative] – I coined this term, but I now wish I hadn’t. It’s not a term more than like two hundred people will Read more

I’ve been asked: you got to work for [client]! How did you manage that? The answer is: I spent seven years building a games studio with a reputation for interactive writing. This isn’t a route available to most people, so it sounds glib to say it. Another answer is to talk about the criteria that I used to hire writers Read more

I did an interview with Eurogamer, in which I talked about writing for the Dragon Age franchise. It went up yesterday with a slightly more provocative title than I expected: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2017-05-19-writing-the-next-dragon-age Okay, that’s an inference you could make from what I said, but it’s not what I said. We’re in GLOMAR territory: I can neither confirm Read more

Actually my title was ‘How Things End’, but I prefer their subhead. I’ve written about the way endings in games have changed in response to technology and biz, and where we might go in the future. I’ve really enjoyed the Eurogamer columns! But my brain is full of dragons at the moment (yes, I’m allowed Read more

This is a post about depression and suicide, not about games. If you work in the games industry, you certainly know, or will know, someone who suffers seriously from stress and depression. That person may be you. Today would be the forty-second birthday of my brother, Hugh, if he hadn’t killed himself when he was Read more

There’s not much point blogging during GDC – only like six people will ever read this – but it’s timely today and I keep meaning to blow the dust off this thing. Failbetter, the company I founded and later tearfully sold, is concluding a very successful Kickstarter for their next project, Sunless Skies, a narrative Read more

I’ve just uploaded a couple of bug fixes and a Linux build for Cultist Simulator: – Bug fix: the Consent of Wounds can now be found in a certain book. – Bug fix: newly created cards should no longer disappear when dropped in an unsuitable place. – TOTALLY UNTESTED Linux build now available. That’s Read more

This is the side project I’ve been working on for the last few months. It’s really only an alpha: just a sliver of content, rough edges on the UI, some bugs. In an unusual commercial strategy, I’m going to halt development on it next week and not touch anything for some months. This is annoying for Read more

Here’s a screenshot from the content I’m working on at the moment. Our protagonist’s occult studies have taken their toll, and the money’s run out. To cover his expenses, he’s been forced to take a job at the lamentable Glover & Glover. Needs must: that Starvation token in the background has just grabbed another Health Read more